Game 9: Winnipeg Jets vs Utah Mammoth pre-game report

The Jets held an optional skate on Saturday as today’s game concludes three games in four days. The most notable occurrence yesterday was that captain Adam Lowry was in a regular jersey as he continues to work his way back from offseason hip surgery. Winnipeg has won six of their last seven sitting in 3rd in the Central.

Their opponent from Utah this evening come into town as the top team in the Central Division having won six straight games including last night in St. Paul which saw the Mammoth defeat the Wild by a final score of 6-2. While they’ve been perfect at home (4-0-0) on the road they have gone 3-2-0 although they began the season 1-2-0 and have won their last two away from home. They have been excellent this season at 5 on 5 while their special teams are middle of the pack with the 15th ranked PP and 19th ranked PK.

Skate news:

No morning skate.

Warm-up news:

Luke Schenn back in and Colin Miller comes back out.

Jets projected lines & D pairs:

Connor-Scheifele-Vilardi
Niederreiter-Namestnikov-Nyquist
Iafallo-Toews-Chibrikov
Koepke-Barron-Pearson

Morrissey-DeMelo
Stanley-Pionk
Fleury-Schenn

Hellebuyck
Comrie

Mammoth projected lines & D pairs:

Keller – Hayton -Schmaltz
Peterka – Cooley – Guenther
Carcone – McBain – Crousse
Tanev -Stenlund – O’Brien

Simashev -Sergachev
Schmidt – Marino
Maata – Cole

Vanecek
Vejmelka

This was how they lined up against the Wild on Saturday and since Vejmelka played in the game, tonight’s starter is likely Vitek Vanecek.

Coach media availability:

Topics:
1) Thoughts on Utah.
2) Their commitment to defence (:38)
3) Nate Schmidt wining a cup (1:10)
4) Any lineup insight? (1:40)
5) Maintaining their structure vs two hot lines (1:45)
6) How does preparation change with this schedule? (2:39)
7) Not having a lot of practice time (3:40)
8) Challenges to getting Adam Lowry back in (4:26)

Up Next:

Puck drop is at 5 PM CDT. Be sure to head over to illegalcurve.com following the game for a recap of the action. You can join us on our YouTube channel for the Illegal Curve Post-Game Show around 7:40 PM CDT as we discuss and analyze the results of the game.